1. Towards the North Sea-Baltic Corridor Work Plan
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1. Towards the North Sea-Baltic Corridor work plan Background Transport is a vital element of European integration and smooth and effective cross border transport is a key element in the effectiveness of the Single Market and the creation of jobs and growth. Moreover, the construction of new transport infrastructure can provide many of those jobs. Similar to the environment, transport is a policy that is easily understood and can find support among the citizens of Europe at a time when the concept of European integration is under heavier criticism than ever before. Transport clearly requires cooperation between Member States on policies created by the Union to facilitate the smooth transit of goods, services and people throughout the European Union (EU) for the benefit of all its citizens. In 1994 the EU initiated the trans-European transport network policy. In the first years, the policy concentrated on supporting 30 priority projects across the EU. With the reform of the TEN-T guidelines in the years before 2014 the concept of a dual layer structure was introduced, consisting of a comprehensive network and a core network based on a common and transparent methodology. Regulation No 1315/2013 of 11 December 2013 established the core network through nine core network corridors involving all the member states and covering the whole of the enlarged EU. The core network corridors enable the Member States to achieve a coordinated and synchronised approach with regard to investment in infrastructure, so as to manage capacities in the most efficient way. It should be multimodal; that is to say it should include all transport modes and their connections as well as relevant traffic and information management systems. During 2014 the Commission-designated consultancy Proximare prepared a Study ("The Study") on the Corridor by means of four reports presented to the four corridor fora held in March, June, October and November 2014. This Work Plan will be based partly on the Study and partly on the input received from the four corridor fora which included participants not only from the eight Member States, but also from the infrastructure managers, the ports, the inland ports and the regions along the corridor. The fora proved to be important and constructive gatherings of stakeholders whose support is vital if the policy is to be successfully implemented. The Study has taken an inventory of the infrastructure existing on the corridor, analysed the problem areas, reviewed the existing studies and assembled the 291 projects proposed by the Member States and the stakeholders for achieving the corridor concept along the whole alignment from Helsinki to Antwerp/Rotterdam/Amsterdam. 1 Figure 1: Screen shot of the northern network of the core network corridors showing the North Sea-Baltic in red with the main interconnection points with the other corridors Under Article 42.1 of the Regulation the core network corridors are "an instrument to facilitate the coordinated implementation of the core network. In order to lead to resource efficient multimodal, thereby contributing to cohesion through improved territorial cooperation, core network corridors shall be focused on a) modal integration, b) interoperability and c) a coordinated development of infrastructure, in particular cross- border sections and bottlenecks". The 3200 km long North Sea-Baltic Corridor is one of these nine core network corridors and the only one to be situated exclusively in the North of Europe. It joins the Baltic Sea Region with the low countries of the North Sea Region by way of Helsinki, the Baltic States, Poland and Germany. While there is strong traffic in the western end of the corridor from the four largest ports in Europe (Rotterdam, Antwerp, Hamburg and Amsterdam) to the hinterland of the Low Countries and Germany up to Berlin, the flow then lessens from Berlin to Warsaw and, for rail at least, the connection with the Baltic States to the North from Poland is underdeveloped, although the maritime connection between Helsinki and Tallinn works efficiently. The first ideas for improving the terrestrial connections of the Baltic States to the rest of the EU occurred during the negotiations for the accession of the three Baltic States which culminated in the Rail Baltic project for a new 1435 mm standard gauge rail connection from Tallinn to Warsaw thereby linking the new states with an interoperable faster direct rail line for the transport of goods and people and offering an alternative to the predominant traffic flows with Russia and Belarus. Therefore it is a strong strategic component in the North Sea-Baltic Corridor. It attempts to create new traffic flows in a North/South direction on the eastern shore of the Baltic and connect them to the well- established West/East flows between the North Sea ports, Berlin and Warsaw. There exists a lot of untapped economic potential in the northern and eastern parts of the Corridor. For example, Finland and Estonia are front-runners in using the information technology sector for smart transport solutions and inter-city links. Meanwhile Poland is an industrial frontrunner among the newer Member States and is one of the EU countries which best weathered the recent economic crisis. 2 This Corridor needs to be looked at in the context of developing global transport routes. Finland and the Baltic States serve as a hub for the terrestrial connections to the eastern and northern markets in China, Russia, Asia and beyond, while the North Sea ports provide maritime access to the Americas and the rest of the global trading network. Also there is the possibility of connecting in the North to the developing ideas of the Northern Dimension Policy. Transferring goods entering through the Western gateways of the North Sea ports along the land connections and Motorways of the Sea towards the Eastern Member States provides possibilities for further development of the new Member States in the Eastern part of the Corridor. The Baltic States and Poland have already proved that they are highly committed to the development of their infrastructure and will make the best possible use of the EU funding possibilities. With the improved transport connections in the eastern part of the Corridor, the Member States situated there can serve as a window for the goods coming from the East including the Asian Republics and China and from Russia in the North. The creation and realisation of this Corridor from Helsinki to the North Sea ports will give a competitive advantage to all the Member States on the Corridor and will be of mutual benefit to all of them. Main Objectives The North Sea-Baltic Corridor is linking some of the most important ports in Europe. These connections are not only between the ports themselves but crucially also with the hinterland of each of them - either the "last mile" connection into the port itself or the medium connections to the nearest inland node and the longer connections to the Core Network main corridor. The objective of the North Sea-Baltic Corridor is to link these ports by all available transport modes - not only by sea, but by rail, roads, inland waterways and air. In other words the links should be multi-modal as well as including relevant traffic and information management systems. Firstly, the Corridor is not complete in the sense that it lacks a 1435 mm rail connection between Sestokai (22 kilometres inside the Lithuanian border with Poland) to Tallinn on the Gulf of Finland. This "break-of-gauge" is not only a missing link but also creates a bottleneck where the two gauges meet as passengers and goods are obliged to change trains from the 1435 mm gauge used in four of the Member States (BE, NL, DE and PL) to the 1520 mm gauge used in the Baltic States. This is why the Rail Baltic project for a new direct line is so important and must be a primary objective of the North Sea-Baltic Corridor. A second important feature of the North Sea-Baltic Corridor is that of its important urban nodes that are the multi-modal connecting points (hubs) with other Corridor. Helsinki connects with the Scandinavian-Mediterranean Corridor. Warsaw and Poznan connect with the Baltic - Adriatic Corridor, while Berlin and Hannover connect with both the Orient – East Mediterranean and the Scandinavian- Mediterranean corridors. Further west, Cologne, Nijmegen, Liege and Brussels intersect with the Rhine – Alpine Corridor and at its western end points, Antwerp, Rotterdam and Amsterdam connect with the Rhine - Alpine and the North Sea –Mediterranean Corridors. Developing the transport interconnectivity of the key urban nodes is a vital objective of the Corridor. These nodes of high economic importance are recognised as having crucial 3 importance not only to this Corridor, but also to the rest of the network. Actions taken at the crossing-points of the Corridors for improving interoperability, multimodality and interconnections are of crucial importance due to the complications found in them. Connectivity within these nodes requires special emphasis due to a very high level of congestion. Deployment of new info-technology solutions is highly relevant here. A fourth objective of the Corridor (as with all the other eight corridors) is that the transport infrastructure requirements for all modes should be complied with by 2030; the date the core network should be completed. The North Sea-Baltic Corridor links all the eight capitals of the eight Member States concerned and the corridor crosses eight national borders (1 maritime: FI-EE and seven terrestrial: EE-LV; LV-LT; LT-PL; PL-DE; DE-NL; NL-BE; DE-BE). Cross border sections (as defined) will have a high priority in the work to be carried out on the corridor. Also the North Sea-Baltic Corridor links four older Member States with four newer Member States.